The Internet Broke Brand Loyalty

https://www.nytimes.
com/2021/11/18/technology/amazon-instagram-
brand-loyalty.html
THE ON TECH NEWSLETTER
The Internet Broke Brand Loyalty

You loved TikTok leggings. Will you ever buy them again?
By Shira Ovide
Nov. 18, 2021
This article is part of the On Tech newsletter. Here is a collection of past columns.
A few winters ago, I and many other American women purchased the Amazon Coat, a
fairly affordable piece of outerwear that grabbed attention for a hot minute. It’s an OK
coat, but I keep forgetting the name of the manufacturer. I doubt that I’m a customer for
life.
I’m not an oddball in this respect. One way that our lives online have rewired our brains
is that we’re more comfortable buying from an unfamiliar brand. And those same
changing habits may also be making us less loyal to anything that we buy.
I was talking about this phenomenon recently with Josh Lowitz and Michael R. Levin, the
co-founders of the research firm Consumer Intelligence Research Partners. We talked
about the ways that online customer reviews, relatively low-cost social media
advertising, and newer shopping destinations like Amazon and Instagram have
reordered how we evaluate and buy products. It’s thrilling in many ways, and not so
great in others.
Think about the ways that you might have bought something in the Before Times — like,
before 2010. Maybe you drove to your local hardware store looking for a cordless drill,
and it stocked only DeWalt models.
You trusted the store to sell a good product — or if you didn’t, it was your only option
anyway. That’s what you bought. The retailer essentially made the choice for you, Levin
and Lowitz said.
That’s not usually how we shop anymore. Instead of having that solo choice, we can
browse the gazillion cordless drills on Amazon from our sofas and evaluate online
customer reviews.
Start-ups like Dollar Shave Club and Warby Parker proved that a clever product and
canny advertising can turn us away from old standbys. We don’t need the store to be the
arbiter of what we buy anymore. We might just need nudges on Instagram to persuade
us to try new cookware.
In many ways, this is awesome. A one-person company might need only a Shopify
website, listings on Amazon or a Facebook page to compete with multinational
conglomerates. Powerhouses like Nike or Levi’s can’t rest on their laurels for a century.
We get more choices, are more open to trying something new and great products can
break through.
But like me and my Amazon coat, it may be harder than ever to form a lasting
relationship. Maybe you bought the vacuum cleaner that you saw everywhere on TikTok,
but will you ever buy from that company again? These young companies, as Lowitz
described, “succeed in making sales but not customers.”
What happens if companies focus solely on selling us something immediately, not on

making us loyal customers? If companies need only to persuade us to buy something
once, I wonder if it creates incentives to make meh products.
There is also a cost to choices. There are more chances for us to get duped from bogus
reviews or other online tricks. Sometimes, it’s a relief to have only one option of cordless
drills rather than having to pick from an ocean of them online.
Molson Hart, the owner of the educational toy company Viahart that I wrote about earlier
this year, told me that he believed it was still possible to build a great brand with lasting
customers. It just takes fresh skills.
Products that might have been drive-by purchases on Amazon can encourage repeat
buyers by tucking in welcome messages in the product packaging, or reaching out to
people who post raves on social media, he said.
The idea is to be in people’s minds, so that they’ll come back for another purchase, leave
a positive review on Amazon or both. (Not all customers love these tactics. And some
Amazon sellers go too far by offering gift cards in exchange for reviews, which is against
the company’s rules.)
“Whether it is a store, Shopify, Amazon, a billboard, an advertisement … whatever. If you

can get people’s attention and get them to think your product is good, you’re creating a
brand,” Hart said. “It doesn’t matter how you do it.”
We don’t usually step back and think about why we buy certain products. When we do,
it’s remarkable how much we’ve changed, and all the ways our habits have bent the
shopping world.
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TIP OF THE WEEK

Digital video games or the real thing?
Brian X. Chen, the consumer technology columnist for The New York Times, tackles a
burning question for video gamers, particularly the novices.
This week, Greg Bensinger from The Times Opinion team asked me for holiday help:
“We got our kids a Nintendo Switch for Hanukkah,” Greg said. “But it’s been so long since
I owned a console of any type. Is it better to buy the physical versions of games or
download digital copies?”
There are pros and cons for each format, and you can mix and match. Here is my advice
for Greg and others making a similar choice.
Game downloads: Instant gratification and convenience are the biggest advantages of
buying digital copies of video games. You don’t need to drive to a store or wait for a game
to arrive in the mail. Downloads also don’t clutter your living room the way physical
games do.
But downloading games may cost more. Stores drop the prices fairly quickly for older
games, but that typically applies only to physical versions. Digital titles stay at original
prices for longer, and price cuts may happen only occasionally.
Another disadvantage of going digital is that the games quickly clog up storage space on
the console. On the Switch, this can be remedied by buying a memory card.
Physical games: One benefit is that you can loan a game to someone else once you’re
done playing it or trade it in at a reseller like GameStop for store credit.
There is no difference in performance. Video games run just as quickly if you’re playing a
digital copy or playing it off a cartridge.
Games you hold in your hands have another major advantage this time of year: Gift
wrapping a game is much more festive than emailing a digital download code to a loved
one.
(And if you’re curious, Greg decided to go for physical games for his family’s new
Switch.)
Before we go …
Good news for your wallet and the planet: It would be annoying and expensive if you
could get your car muffler replaced only at the dealership. Until this week, that was
essentially how Apple controlled repairs for the iPhone. Brian explains the benefits of
Apple’s agreeing to start selling parts, tools and instructions to any repair shop and
home gadget fixers.
An odd side effect of the U.S. embargo: Mailchimp, the software company that powers
emailed newsletters, temporarily blocked at least three independent news
organizations in Cuba from sending their information to subscribers, Rest of World
reports. The account bans appeared to be related to the decades-old U.S. embargo of
Cuba, but Mailchimp reinstated the news organizations’ accounts.
They want a piece of the potential U.S. chip boom: My colleague David McCabe went
to Taylor, Texas, to see one of the many U.S. cities or states that are trying to get a new
computer chip factory in their backyards. Their tactics are raising questions about how
far communities should go — and how much taxpayer money they should pay — to get
a piece of the high-tech economy.
Hugs to this
Baby Ruffles is believed to be the first native-born harbor seal in New York’s Jamaica
Bay for nearly 100 years. The local news publication The Wave said that the birth was a
sign of significantly improved water quality in Jamaica Bay.
Join us for a virtual event on Thursday to discuss the secrets of productive and healthy
online communities. Read this to learn more about the event and reserve your spot.
If you don’t already get this newsletter in your inbox, please sign up here. You can also read
past On Tech columns.

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THE ON TECH NEWSLETTER

Nov. 18, 2021

What happens if companies focus solely on selling us something immediately, not on

“Whether it is a store, Shopify, Amazon, a billboard, an advertisement … whatever. If you

TIP OF THE WEEK

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